Although it does not have its own zip code, as happens each year, a small village is emerging adjacent to South Williamsport’s Little League complex. Talented people are gathering at ‘ESPNville’, preparing to tell the world what is happening at the Little League World Series.
TV and the World Series predate ESPN’s arrival. In 1963-64, ABC began Series coverage, airing the championship game on a tape-delayed basis. From 1965 to 1985, the championship game was broadcast during the weekend, airing on the network’s Wide World of Sports.
ESPN entered the scene in 1987, and the Series has had full TV coverage ever since.
Forty years prior, at the very first Little League World Series, local radio was on the scene, informing the local community about what has become an international phenomenon. That tradition will continue this year.
As veteran World Series announcer Ken Sawyer prepared for this year’s event, he took time to share his thoughts with Webb Weekly.
“WRAK has been involved with the Little League World Series since the very beginning in 1947. If you look back at the history of radio and the World Series, you’ll find that WRAK, WWPA, and WLYC were part of those early Series broadcasts. WRAK’s station was right down the street from the Original Field, so it was natural for them to do that. Then, when the Series moved to South Williamsport, WMPT and Bill Byham began broadcasting games.
“WRAK and now iHeart Media have had a long-standing relationship with Little League. Each spring, there is a negotiation between the two parties regarding the broadcast contract. Not much changes from year to year; change the date, sign it, and proceed is the usual course of business.
“Unlike ESPN, the iHeart broadcast crew is small in numbers. We have an engineer who comes in and sets up the equipment and stays through the first few days of the Series, Troy Lee — who runs everything back at the studio, and sometimes he is running two games simultaneously, and our five-man announcing team.” (Note: Ken Sawyer, Gary Chrisman, Scott Lowery, Tom O’Malley, and Tom Speicher have combined for 205 years of Little League Baseball World Series broadcasting experience.)
“Over the years, we’ve had a tremendous outpouring of support from local sponsors. Through Little League, Williamsport is known all over the world, but locally, so many people are working and can’t get to the games. So, radio really provides a community service to those folks by providing an outlet to listen to the games. This is of interest to our sponsors because they know there is a local audience listening to the games. They know the radio will be there because we have been since the very beginning.
“I don’t know how many people had told me over the years, ‘I’ve lived here all my life and I’ve never been to a game.’ We try to not only bring people the game and the action on the field, but also the atmosphere surrounding the event. I try to encourage people that even if you don’t like baseball, just go to a game, meet the people, soak it all in. For those at home, we try to bring that to them.
“At one point, we only had one radio station we could use, and we would switch between the two World Series stadiums to get the games on the air. We were able to put the games on the internet when they weren’t on the radio. But as things evolved, that changed, and we were able to use more than one station. Today, the International games will be on WRAK 1400, and the United States games are carried on 95.5 FM. On the final weekend, the International and U.S. championship games, as well as the World Series championship game, will be broadcast on both 102.7 FM and WRAK.”
Local radio has also had the opportunity to feed its broadcasts to stations around the country.
“Some years, if it’s a small town, we are more likely to have a radio station that wants to carry the broadcasts. Bigger cities seldom have a station that wants to do that. We connect that local station with our broadcasts. When we break for a commercial, the station we are feeding does the same, and they can interject their own commercial messages to that local audience.
“As TV has become more prominent and is covering all of the games, we’ve had fewer instances where we are feeding games. But most years, we’ll have a station that contacts us for a feed. When Hawaii is here, they are our biggest supporters, and we’ve been feeding them for years.”
Each year, the Series remains something very special for Sawyer.
“It is one of the high points of the year. It’s about the kids. To see how these young people come here from all over the world, and the awe that strikes them. But, they are able to put that all away when it is time to play ball. They work so hard, travel so many miles to be able to get here, and now it’s their chance, and they know they will be able to preserve this for the rest of their lives. They experience things here they’ve never done before. To me, it is just the fun of the world coming together and being relatively calm and getting along for two weeks. That feels good!”
If you can’t get to the games, radio will be there. Give them a listen!
